Winding Down.

How fast time flies is actually frightening.

11 May, we moved out of our house.  The girls and pretty much everyone went back to the states and some people are continuing to travel for a week or two more, like Tara and me.

Our house, 84 via Ghibellina, gave us some unreal memories these last 4 or so months...
Sleepovers after nights out.
The best tasting meals eaten together in the kitchen.
Drinking wine, sitting around, talking about our lives.
Homework sessions at the kitchen table.
Blasting music while getting ready for a night out.
Attempting to do laundry, and setting up all the drying racks, taking over our entire living room area.
Being locked out for almost 20 hours.

All of these, many others, and most importantly; Bonds of friendship that will last for a very long time.

Literally feels like 2 days ago Lauren, Tara, Austin and me stepped off the plane into the Florence airport... Running into Gianna, knowing she was our roommate, but not actually knowing her, outside waiting to be driven to our apartment; her suitcases almost the size of her, if not bigger.

Arriving to our house, lugging up our heavier than 50lb suitcases, we met our fourth roommate, Amanda, and started to get situated.
I remember my exact feelings. Flustered, overwhelmed, extremely tired, way too excited.  I remember feeling like I was not living a real life. Like the first few weeks were fake.

Making new friends, meeting each others' friends from home who were studying here, building new relationships and checking out every bar and club near us... We eventually became very comfortable.

Traveling to 11 different countries, and multiple cities in each of those and throughout Italy;
Interlaken, Switzerland
Madrid, Barcelona, and Ibiza, Spain
Lake Bled, Slovenia
Prague, Czech Republic
Berlin, Germany
Paris, Versailles, Nice and Cannes, France
Montecarlo, Monoco
Brussels, Belgium
Amsterdam, Netherlands
Almafi Coast, Italy
Corfu, Greece

We accomplished A LOT this semester.  By traveling so much, I've experienced so many situations that have taught me so much more responsibility and independence than I would have learned at home.

Waking up late and sprinting to the train station.
Forgetting to print out a boarding pass and attempting to talk our way out of paying 70euro at the airport.
Purchasing a 2nd class train ticket and ending up on first class, taking advantage of the free food and drink... Then getting caught and kicked out. Twice.
Hopping on the wrong train, driving right through Florence and to Milan instead. 50euro and 4 hours later, finally returning back home to Florence.
Experiencing broken showers and heat in hostel rooms.
Communicating through multiple language barriers all across Europe.
Volunteering and transporting myself to teach at a local Italian elementary school in the outskirts of Florence.
Conquering and becoming pros at directions and using maps.
Using and learning the public transportation in all the countries we visited.
Becoming so much better at the Italian language.
...and so much more.

Unforgettable Experiences
Celebrating my 21st birthday in Italy.
Meeting family in other cities in Tuscany I never knew I had, and having dinner with them.
Went on an Italian wine tasting in the most authentic Chianti region.
Took a bus to a panoramic overlook of all of Florence, and watched the sunset.
Watched the sunrise in Plaza Cataluyna in Barcelona.
Ate a heart-shaped pizza on Valentine's Day on the Ponte Vecchio.
Joined a gym and became friends with the trainers and took workout classes with all the local Italians.
Drank wine and watched the sunset multiple times at Piazzale Michelangelo.
Experienced Notte Bianca Firenze.
Swam in the waters of Capri, while on a private boat tour around the island.
Bungy-jumped into a canyon of the Swiss Alps.
Cliff jumped in Corfu, Greece.
Ate a real Gyro while in Greece.
Ate a real Belgium waffle while in Belgium.
Ate  real French onion soup in Paris and Versailles.
...okay I'm done with the food part...
Went to the famous Montecarlo Casino.
Went to the biggest night club in the world (maximum capacity is 17,000 people); Privilege in Ibiza, Spain.
Went to 5 different countries in 10 days.
...The list goes on, and on.

Fully out of our apartment; Lauren and Gianna have been home the past few days. We're already planning a road trip to the East coast this summer to visit G, Cathy, and our other friends from New York and New Jersey.

I can't wrap my mind around how unreal this semester abroad was. I'll never understand how those who are able to study abroad don't do it. They definitely missed out on the best time of their lives.

Notte Bianca.

Notte Bianca 2013 Firenze.

Ponte Vecchio

Hearing nothing but awesome things about this night, I was pumped to experience it while being here!
On 30 april, every bigger piazza in Firenze had either live music, DJs, some type events going on, and/or a bunch of decorations.  A bunch of the awesome panini places are open form 6pm to 6am along with the gelaterias and other stores. Our goal was to make it to our favorite panini shop, Pino's by 6am.

Santa Croce

The streets and piazze were packed with people drinking, eating, dancing and celebrating this night, starting at 6pm.
We decided to get some bottles of wine and walk around.  Heading to the Ponte Vecchio, we sat on the bridge talking and drinking wine.  All of a sudden a smaller marching band comes walking down the street and stops right in front of where we were sitting.  They played for about fifteen minutes, in the middle of a huge crowd and everyone was watching and dancing to their awesome music. It was the best, and this was only the beginning of the night.

We walked to Piazza Santa Croce, which is right by our houses.  Meeting Austin and Jimmy there, and then Tara, we all hung out on the steps and ran into a ton of people we knew.
Eventually we headed to another big piazza, Santo Spirito, which is across the Arno.  Walking through the Ponte Vecchio we see a huge group of our friends and all walk to Santo Spirito together.
It was so fun to be walking and randomly run into people you wanted to meet up with and then all hanging at a piazza together, with a ton of other people and live music around.

Santo Spirito

We stayed at Santo Spirito for a while and then walked to the other side of the river by our houses.  There were games going on and bars with live music outside them, restaurants grilling and serving food outside, all throughout the city center. It was something that I've never experienced.
Trying to relate it to something, it was like the taste of Elmwood Park. Or even the taste of Chicago. But times like, 100.
It was all throughout the city, not secluded into one field or one area.  Every big piazza, every bridge, all through the streets and outside each restaurant.  So many people enjoying it all and up until all hours of the night/morning.

Stopping to meet some of Cathy's Italian friends in a different piazza and then into one of the pubs to watch the end the Blackhawks game (which was our time around 4am), we reach our goal and made it to Pino's by 5:30am.

Each of us enjoyed our favorite panini for breakfast, and walked home around 7am.
I could not believe we stayed up for that long, and it wasn't only us... Pretty much all of Florence was up for at least 12 hours.
This is probably one of the funnest nights I've had and all we did was walk around and be with all our friends.  It was the best.

Pino.

Vino.

Wine Tasting in Chianti.

When Auntie Kelly visited Tara, us three signed up for an 8 person wine tasting.  It was an 8 person tour, including; personal pick up and drop off services, visiting two wineries in the Chianti region between Florence and Siena, and a few other stops in-between.

Being picked up at 2:30 on that Friday, by a brand new black Mercedes van... We find out we're the only three people on the tour. Personal wine tasting for just us three? Awesome.

We drive through Florence and into more of the countryside, away from the city center.  Our driver, giving us facts about every thing we passed by and teaching us about the old rivalries between Florence and Siena, he was awesome.  I think I may have learned more in those few hours than I have in some of my classes...

The first town we stopped at was Impruneta.  The town of terra cotta. This is where terra cotta originated.  It is an older, historic and tiny town, and we just stopped in the main square, got some coffee and continued to the first winery.

Taking Route 222; the main Chianti road, we arrived at the first stop. Andrea was our guide in leading us through the tour.  We saw the cellars, where the wine is stored, where it is fermented and he explained to us the multiple ways the different wines are created.
We sat down at a table with two wine glasses; one for red, one for white. There were plates with different pieces of meat, cheese and bread, along with about 8 bottles of wine and some balsamic on the table.  I was so excited.


Andrea gave us tastes of each white wine first.  We tried the cheese and meat and then the bottles of balsamic. My favorite was the 20 year aged balsamic. It so so unbelievably good.  It could go on anything from strawberries to cheese to even vanilla gelato. Guess how much it's sold for.... 79euro per little bottle. It's that good.

I really liked the red wines.  My favorite was the Chianti Classico.  That's the most popular wine of the region and apparently has super, super strict rules when creating it.  As long as there is the label, DOCG on the bottle with the black rooster, it's the real Chianti.
We tried white wine at the end, more sparkly and bubbly than usual and then ended with a dessert liquor which we dipped biscotti in for 10 seconds and then ate it.

The food and wine was awesome.  This was in the middle of the country in Toscana, on a huge piece of land where they make their own wine, olive oil and house great cheese and meat.  It was my favorite.

We bought a few bottles at their store, and left to head to the second winery deeper into Siena.

This place was amazing.  Not only was it a winery, but it was also a bigger farmhouse/resort type thing that they rent out for certain parts of the year.  There was a swimming pool and a bunch of little patios.  It was touristy either, it looked like someone's house.  There was a huge winery in the back and the whole property over looked a ton of land where they grow the grapes and olives.

We got a tour of the cellars and the woman explained how they created and fermented their wines.  This place seemed a little more modern than the first.  We sat and got tastes of their wines, cheeses and meats.  They made olive oil and wine here, not balsamic or cheeses.  This place was really cool and their homemade biscotti were so good.  But not as good as Nonni's :)
We left there and headed back with our driver to our place in Florence.  We got home around 9pm. It was a long tour and so much fun.  I loved learning about all the different wines, how they're made and how the Chianti wine was started and created.
I know how to properly taste wine and got to experience a real and authentic Italian wine tasting.